After a 29-year lull where no new residence halls were built, UA is now building halls at the fastest rate since the 1960s to deal with rising enrollment and housing shortages.

Last year, the demand for residence halls was great and so many students were guaranteed spaces that 500 students were placed in temporary housing that included study lounges, hotels and with resident assistants.

Enrollment has always grown and fallen back in waves at UA, but construction of on-campus housing has sometimes lagged a little behind.

From 1953 to 1971 the enrollment at UA started to increase rapidly, growing by an average of 1,200 students per year.

To accommodate the rapid growth, during which enrollment went from 5,843 to 26,021, seven of the current residence halls were built.

But after Coronado Hall was built in 1966 ÷ adding what is now 800 spots for students ÷ no halls were built until La Paz came online in 1995, possibly due to slower enrollment growth in the ā70s and ā80s.

From 1970 to 1988, another 18-year period, enrollment grew by about 6,000 students ÷ a fraction of the growth seen from 1953 to 1971.

Now Residence Life has imposed new rules in the midst of a housing shortage and has become more space conscious than ever.

"I really donāt know why there (were) no halls built then. I got here in the mid Ī80s," said Jim Van Arsdel, director of residence life and university housing.

Van Arsdel doesnāt know of any halls built during the 1970s and 1980s that were torn down, but a look at old campus maps reveals new buildings in the footprints of older buildings that are nowhere to be found.

Papago Lodge, Hopi Hallās "mirror image" was in about the same spot where La Paz now stands.

"The world was a different place back then. I donāt mean to patronize, but it seems to me that back in the Ī70s and early Ī80s the university defined success with residence halls as being cheap and the quality of halls became bad," Van Arsdel said.

"It was weird then, there was a high demand in the summer and lots moved out by December, so there might have been 600 open spaces," he said.

In the more recent past, various housing shortages have caused Residence Life to instill a guaranteed housing deadline, give priority to freshmen (to the chagrin of returning students), pack students into triple occupancy in areas now used as double, quadruple students in rooms at Arizona-Sonora Hall, rent Greek houses of cash strapped chapters and buy apartments.

The shortage is due to the growing numbers of incoming freshmen. But last year a higher-than-average number of sophomores also wanted to return, Van Arsdel said.

In 2001-02, 4,500 freshmen, about 1,000 sophomores and a total of 400 juniors and seniors lived in the residence halls.

This all came to a head last year when UA decided to eliminate the guaranteed housing deadline, limit returning students to 1,000 and put a four-semester limit on living on-campus.

Residence Life planners might ease up on the rules in the future, if space permits.

Highland District Housing is supposed to open one residence hall and 300 spots next fall and two more halls by fall of 2004 for a total of 760 beds.

Provided that enrollment and the demand for housing remains steady, there is the possibility that the 1,000 returning student rule, or four semester ban, could be lifted once the Highland District Housing is completed, said Pam Obando associate director for marketing of Residence Life.

Once the Highland Halls are completed, Residence Life is also considering a number of other options, like replacing the one-story Hopi Hall with more space-efficient building, closing Sierra Hall which is not "a quality living space" or getting rid off the expensive and unpopular UA-run apartments, Van Arsdel said.

With almost 8,000 freshmen expected this fall, Residence Life was bracing for a repeat of last year. But with cancellations, they have actually accepted everyone on the waiting list and began taking applications again, which had stopped on April 9.

"At first the demand this year was far above last year. It was scary. But with the cancellations it went down," Van Arsdel said.

Residence Life has begun looking down the road at where the next two halls will be constructed after the Highland District Housing, now under construction, is finished. Building them will mean possibly replacing the parking lots south of Coronado Hall or south of Apache-Santa Cruz Hall, which have a total of 488 spaces.

"I guess (building a residence hall) behind Coronado would be better because a lot of people in the dorms in the Apache-Santa Cruz area park in the lot south of it. Coronado has the Tyndall Garage," said Mike Delahanty, Parking and Transportation Services operations manager.

"Anytime we lose parking it is a bad thing though," he added.

Residence Life planners have an eye on a fall 2005 opening for the next set of residence halls on the horizon, which would have to be approved by the Arizona Board of Regents.